Friday Flash Fiction: “Spoiler Warnings”

I was really into comic books in middle school and high school. Once a week, my mother would drive me out to Galaxy Comics on 190th Street, and I’d spend most of my $20 allowance on DC books–Green Lantern, Justice League (the inimitable Giffen/DeMatteis run), Star Trek (I still have fond memories of the Barr/Sutton/Villagran Mirror Universe arc), and more.

I remember following all four Superman titles, which DC had scheduled so there would be a new issue out every week and plenty of crossover storylines. I was never into Batman, but I picked up Wonder Woman for a while after I saw George Perez’s art in Crisis on Infinite Earths. My parents probably have lots of bagged-and-boarded back issues in their garage somewhere.

When I went away to college, I drifted away from the comics scene. Too many other things going on, I didn’t know where the local shops were, and I didn’t have an easy way to get there. I found that I didn’t really miss it that much.

It wasn’t until 2004, when we ran the Justice Unlimited Game, that I got back into comics. Doing research for a superhero-themed puzzle hunt was a great excuse for me to catch up with changes in the DC Universe (the new Green Lantern is who?) and pick up some TPB collections of Ultimate X-Men. I also found out that the Mountain View public library stocks tons of comics–go check out the shelves by the Teen Zone, or upstairs for the “mature” titles (read: indie titles).

I’ll never be as enthusiastic as my teenaged self was about comics, but at least now I can pop over to Wikipedia or any number of other web sites to find out what the hell is going on with the latest Interminable Crisis or Marvel Zombie Monkeys. My tastes have also matured somewhat–I really dug Y: The Last Man, I loved Queen and Country, and D and I both enjoy Fables.